Internal testing so far goes up to the end date ? Or are you more focused on some specific period (i.e the start game) ?
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I hope it means you're not gonna make the game easier because of that.
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- Dec 14, 1999
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longterm close to end date
- Dec 14, 1999
- 22.085
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How do AI nations look like in long-term testing. Do they manage to grow as large as an ultra-aggressive human player does?
Is it possible to see if there is a point where a "snowballing" effect will occur? Because the snowballing effect is what makes a late stage game boring as it becomes a game of just mop-up.
I have no good solution for the constitution system (or lack of it) but maybe the devs will cook up something (idk if the privilege system and the law system can somewhat tackle this, but certainly not in Victoria depth like you said). But the fact that we will have laws now and that uprisings will be more than just a few stacks of rebels (and whatever else we don't know about yet) will make revolutions more interesting, especially if it they start in multiple countries at the same time.
I didn't mean material support as a mean to flip nations, more like a plan B to help the revolutionaries if you can't actively intervene directly yourself for some reason. Just a little help to try to tip the odds in the uprising's favor, even if it won't necessarily be the deciding factor in 9/10 or 19/20 cases.
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Have you seen in CK3 in the beginning of the campaign, when your rules dies, your lands get split between your sons? Well, thats how it works in EU5 as well. At least while you have that particular government/inheritance law or whatever governs this rule.
Large empires, large organisation often face challenges from newer and smaller kingdoms that can massively disrupt the status quo.
Big and old empires while having the benefit of being large and stable, can struggle to adapt to changes happening in the world. New ideas or new technology can often be challenging for older large empires to adopt as risky new innovation can disrupt the social order that is carefully balanced.
While newer and smaller realms, because they have less interest to balance, can find it easier to adopt new technologies, new political and social ideas. They are not tied to old legacy interests and the elites in newer realms might be more risk taking.
But now all the advantage in CK3 is weighted purely towards older and larger empires and dynasties. They get more stats stacking, which means they only snowball forever until they conquer the whole map. There's no disruption of any kind.
They get all the tech advances and there's no real issue to their advantages being eroded away.
Could this be a mechanic to simulate why places like China and the Ottomans eventually reach a point where they struggle to adapt with new technologies and new ideas?
Big and old empires while having the benefit of being large and stable, can struggle to adapt to changes happening in the world. New ideas or new technology can often be challenging for older large empires to adopt as risky new innovation can disrupt the social order that is carefully balanced.
While newer and smaller realms, because they have less interest to balance, can find it easier to adopt new technologies, new political and social ideas. They are not tied to old legacy interests and the elites in newer realms might be more risk taking.
But now all the advantage in CK3 is weighted purely towards older and larger empires and dynasties. They get more stats stacking, which means they only snowball forever until they conquer the whole map. There's no disruption of any kind.
They get all the tech advances and there's no real issue to their advantages being eroded away.
Could this be a mechanic to simulate why places like China and the Ottomans eventually reach a point where they struggle to adapt with new technologies and new ideas?
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Unless we are talking about a horde nation vs a smaller kingdom, that is not what historically happened. What did historically happen is the physical limit of communication/travel + illnesses. Roman Empire borders were pretty much the soft limit of any given nation, which changed with medical/logistical innovations in the late 18th century. Even if Vienna fell, it is highly unlikely that the Ottomans could have expanded much more than that (as an example).
These "big and old empires" are the reason for our progress in the post-modern age. What are you on about? Especially the 19th and 20th century was jacked up with innovations and inventions predominantly done in these "big and old Empires". Technically the US is a 20th century Empire that still innovates and inluences the entire world.
But they are tied to the loyalty of their subjects, like everyone else, which is why there is no indication that smaller nations are more innovative.
No. The Ottomans were among the leading nations when it came to military innovations up until the begining of the 18th century. The reason why they fell behind militarily, is becasue the janissaries prevented them. The janissaries also destabilized the nation, preventing other innovative disruptions. That is the period of time, european nations change socially (higher literacy, better medical treatments etc). You can see from the Tanzimat era that the Ottomans rapidly adapted to the times. Their subsequent fall is connected to nothing else other than money. Stock market crashed in the 1870th, which was followed by a famine on the balkan and a war-declaration by the Russians. The Ottomans struggled to gather their normal strength, the entire Russian army pushed all the way to Plevna, Osman Pasha hold the russian army back long enough and peace was restored (hence an entire song was dedicated to him. He became a national hero despite his defeat). But go figure why a nation bankcrupted, still suffering from famine and that just got robbed their industrial heart away (+ massive ethnic cleansing/genocide in Bulgaria, causing a subsequent humanitarian crises in Constantinople + Anatolia), why such a nation did not come out as a success story. Especially when in following wars European superpowers armed balkan nations to their teeth to the point that Greece bankcrupted itself to wage war.
Plot twist: It has nothing to do with size.
I am not familiar enough with China, but I know that eunuchs as a faction were a similar problem as the janissaries in the 18th century. It is not even a never-before-heared story either. The Mamluks had the same fate post late 14th century.
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I think I may know how the Anbennall Eunuch Kingdom, which caused anger among Chinese players, came about......
Eunuchs have never been a social class. In China, eunuchs lack power and are the most loyal loyalists. Because the power of eunuchs cannot be inherited, eunuchs are discriminated against because they are incomplete individuals. Eunuchs also lack descendants, so they have no long-term goals and only consider immediate interests.
The emperor may indeed be deceived by eunuchs, but this is usually because the emperor personally does not want to wake up. The officials who truly deceive the emperor are his officials.
Powerful eunuchs can indeed form powerful factions, but the factions of eunuchs are not stable because their power comes from the emperor, from the emperor's trust and closeness. It does not come from blood, clan, relatives, common beliefs, or even relationships with college classmates.
So one of the abilities that the emperor needs to learn is to form a powerful faction of trusted eunuchs and engage in struggles with internal factions of officials. He needs to maintain the balance of this faction to ensure that officials can work in their spare time during the struggle.
So eunuchs have never been a problem, you can't simply graft the Mamluks onto China.
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I feel like properly rule-changing advances/technologies are something that help with late game boredom. It already somewhat exists in games like EU4, like you have little estate minigames (grant 30% land to estates to get +1 mana initially, then slowly over the decades regain that 30% to no longer have downsides, then work your way up to 100%, then absolutism hits and you wanna reduce privileges to get 100 absolutism. Not the single greatest gameplay loop, but it is kind of what I'm talking about. Various ways in which mechanics unlock or otherwise become obsolete, so the game you play in 1400 is not the same as the one you play in 1800.
I can imagine various ways in which EU5 would improve on these sorts of things. Obviously not only do estates exist, but probably over time, with certain advances, certain estates become more or less important. Perhaps through some series of international issues and domestic choices, the clergy take power in your country. Perhaps the Peasant Wars end in the peasants' favor, and the fourth estate suddenly becomes relevant.
I can also imagine with the new economic system, which is closer to Victoria, establishing new trade routes for newly relevant resources and rerouting/downsizing old, less relevant trade routes (say, lumber as stone/coal become available) becomes a factor in game.
I can imagine various ways in which EU5 would improve on these sorts of things. Obviously not only do estates exist, but probably over time, with certain advances, certain estates become more or less important. Perhaps through some series of international issues and domestic choices, the clergy take power in your country. Perhaps the Peasant Wars end in the peasants' favor, and the fourth estate suddenly becomes relevant.
I can also imagine with the new economic system, which is closer to Victoria, establishing new trade routes for newly relevant resources and rerouting/downsizing old, less relevant trade routes (say, lumber as stone/coal become available) becomes a factor in game.
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Uh... My good friend, I don't mean to be rude, but I just wanted to be a little bit clear about what you meant by that last statement... Is that Chinese eunuchs are acting like praetorians to stop China's technological progress... ?
If that's what you mean, then I can only say as a Chinese that such a statement is absurd. The eunuchs in the Chinese dynasties almost did not have their own power, their power source often has and only one, that is, the emperor. The eunuchs themselves do not have any ability, they can only rely on the trust and authorization of the emperor to do all kinds of things, such as the famous eunuchs such as SiLI Jian or YuMa Jian in the Ming Dynasty, if the emperor does not grant them power or stand on their behalf, then they are useless. Exceptions usually occurred in special periods, such as when there was a ununified known as the Southern Han Dynasty, and the eunuchs of this ununified became part of the ruling class - but this does not mean that these eunuchs were in control of their own power, they also relied on the emperor's favor for eunuchs to achieve this status, otherwise they would have been useless. If I remember correctly, there were also court eunuchs in Byzantium of Europe, although not exactly the same as Chinese eunuchs, but I have never heard of a Byzantine eunuch who had the power to block imperial law or technology without the emperor's authorization.
Um... I would like to say that the conditions of China and the Mamluks are completely different, and that each case should be analyzed on a case-by case basis, and if you do think that the eunuchs prevented the progress of China, and do not think that they were wrong, then I hope that you will later be able to say: "The foolish emperor of China empowered the equally foolish eunuchs, so that they made it easy for the state apparatus to deny progress".
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All of this applies to Mamluks as well. Their descendants were not allowed to become Mamluks. The recruitement was done on the slave market. They were disliked by society and had no long-term goals, only immediate interests. Still ended up controlling the nation. I am not going to dispute their impact (or the lack of it), but none of this is an argument for why they couldnt have any influence.
There is also enough literature about their influence to the point that we can agree that they were not no names with no powers, but that they had some sort of influence over the nation.
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No. Impact on the political direction of the nation. That is my argument. How big? No idea. The janissaries didnt per se block technology either. They blocked military reforms that could endanger their position + they had enough political power to change internal politics. Not laws, but cooperate with other factions to dethrone the sultan. I am not saying the eunuchs had the same power, I frankly speaking have no idea, but I do know that they had a some political influence. On paper the Janissaries were also loyal subject to the Sultan himself. They were literally called "kapi kul" (servants of the port, referring to the Ottoman dynasty).
I compared the Mamluks to the Janissaries, but they share similarities to the eunuchs as well.
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Simple answer:
There is usually just two sources of legitimacy, the pen and the sword, and in both aspects, the eunuch estate as a whole can never pose a real challenge towards the landed gentry.
In terns of the pen, it is hardly possible for eunuchs to gain stronger ideological influence than the Confucian scholar officials unless with the favor of the emperor. In terms of the sword, castrated men who never receive military training were just not good warriors (unlike the Mamluks, which were not castrated, and received proper military training).
The issue of late Imperial China (Ming, Qing) is that there is only one single enormous estate, the landed gentry. They owned land, which is the ultimate source of wealth in China's agricultural economy, thus can keep snowballing by purchasing more land over generations. On the other hand, they controlled the empire's ideology and administration, so there is no one, except perhaps the emperor, who can stop them from snowballing.
Indeed, there are also military estates like hereditary nobles, garrison officials and non-Han Chinese militants. However, their power were usually marginalized and monitored by scholar officials.
So the major challenge for an ambitious emperor is to balance the influence of the landed gentry. This is done by stirring up conflicts among different fractions of scholar officials, as well as by promoting other estates against them. The eunuchs are the most simple option, as they can neither accumulate land over generations, nor they receive military training that allows them to challenge the emperor's rule (so they are different from the Mamluks).
In general, the eunuch estate as a whole is in a weak position as compared to the scholar officials. There were just individual powerful eunuchs, gaining political influence and widespread connections, whose authority cannot be inherited.
Yes they may block some reforms, but they really don't have that much interest in doing so as compared to the landed gentry.
If an individual eunuch managed to gain enough wealth that allows him to challenge the gentry (which is highly unlikely), in most of the case, he will pursue to purchase more land, adopt a son and make him one of the landed gentries, rather than to challenge the existing gentry estate. If he gains military power and influence, then he will probably depose the existing emperor and proclaim himself the new one.
Fun fact: the founder of the Jaunpur Sultanate, Malik Sarwar, was an eunuch. Instead of establishing an eunuch republic or a strong eunuch regency behind the Delhi Sultanate, he
decided to adopt a son and establish his dynasty. Who cares about the welfare of other eunuchs, afterall?
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Historical Russia to Kamchatka or historical Russia only russian principalities and the urals?
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